As a cybertruck owner who likes to drive deep into national parks, I'm optimistic about this. Tesla covers the big highways really well with their superchargers, but where they fall short are those adventure/outdoors destinations. E.g. the north cascades loop in WA state. You can find the occasional level 2 charger but they are painfully slow and aren't maintained well. Prior to the CT, Tesla didn't have "adventure-capable" vehicles, so serving those locations was not a priority. Hopefully with Rivian's DNA being more outdoors-oriented, everyone with a beefy EV can benefit.
It's a pleasure to drive and it has been great for what I use it for. Mostly family stuff but the occasional camping trip in the middle of nowhere. A Rivian R1S probably would have been more practical for me due to the 3 rows of seats. But I love the angular look. It's definitely polarizing, no question.
Some downsides: snow/ice can block the headlights, the windshield wiper and washer fluid sprayer are bad, the range isn't good compared to competitors.
I've not been a huge fan of Tesla generally because of the lack of physical buttons, as well as build quality.
I think my next vehicle, will be at a minimum plug in hybrid, and maybe full BEV, ironically, replacing our dual electric tank hot water heaters allows for us to install a charger.
OP here. Yeah I talk about them a lot. All of the other topics I could talk about, I seldom have original content to contribute. All of the interesting things get said pretty quickly for software engineering, living in a west coast city in the USA, not enjoying ads, etc. But for this one, I'm a relative rarity on this site and I'm enthusiastic about the topic, so there are more frequent opportunities for me to say something unique.
